Latina/Latino Studies Professor Elizabeth Velásquez Estrada was selected to co-lead the second Humanities Research Institute (HRI) Interseminars Initiative project with colleagues Professor Maryam Kashani (Asian American Studies and Gender & Women’s Studies) and Professor Junaid Rana (Asian American American Studies). Their project, titled "Improvise and Intervene,” challenges scholars to reimagine how scholarly theory and methods are taught and practiced, expanding the possibilities for innovation in interdisciplinary, collaborative research design. In this project, faculty and students will explore texts and creative works that grapple with pressing social issues and the multiple methods used in conducting and presenting research. They will also study different genealogies of improvisation and intervention through reading, listening, and watching, while engaging in weekly improvisatory exercises and responses drawn from surrealism, documentary and neorealism, speculative fiction, theater, music, and other sources.

For more details on the project, visit https://hri.illinois.edu/news/second-interseminars-project-and-faculty-conveners-announced?fbclid=IwAR0sFnKarAqtUncMkTR8XU6x7qpI-htI7zCMnk0IIC3kUjfy2gCb_bOYiEM.